Posted
by
Soulskill
on Wednesday November 20, 2013 @01:16AM
from the also-need-an-eyeball-scraping-and-a-chunk-of-lung dept.

schwit1 writes "Some drivers along a busy Fort Worth street on Friday were stopped at a police roadblock and directed into a parking lot, where they were asked by federal contractors for samples of their breath, saliva and even blood. It was part of a government research study aimed at determining the number of drunken or drug-impaired drivers.The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is spending $7.9 million on the survey over three years, said participation was '100 percent voluntary' and anonymous. The 'participants' hardly agree."

Don't let the fact that an armed man and his buddies just forced you off the road, in the dark, convey any kind of misleading impression about the voluntariness of what you are about to do the sensible thing and agree to....

It was a running (bad) joke in TV/films of the 1970s/80s that muggers would frequently 'suggest' in very moderate and 'reasonable' language that their victims might like to consider giving them a 'donation'. The idea was that the situation was so clear, that the actual threat could be left implicit, as if this somehow reduced the criminality, or made the victim some kind of accomplice.

Of course, the mugger would ensure the victim was aware that he had a weapon (frequently dual use, like a screw-driver), so that a classic power game played out.

Now we see the police in the USA using the SAME tactic, but with one more refinement- the use of proxies/mercenaries/'contractors' to do the actual 'mugging' of citizens Human Rights, while the uniformed goons themselves stand to the side as 'back-up'.

Let me ask you all a question. Would you prefer your police-state to be upfront and honest, like say Stalinist East Germany, or Obama style, where everyone pretends the man with the gun and uniform who is forcing you do act against your will is just a friendly, harmless 'servant' of the people.

Would you prefer your mugger to be some lone pathetic loser, or a member of a well organised gang whose power and influence reaches into ever aspect of your city's administration and law enforcement? Team Obama not only abuses you, it pays massive amounts to PR operations so stories of the abuse are ignored or dismissed as untrue by your fellow sheeple.

The police are unwitting participants in this experiment. Gathering data on intoxication is just the cover story. The real experiment is to see whether Texas is as tough as they talk, or if they're going to bitch out and take this shit. If the result is positive, somebody will roll up to the roadblock with an AR-15 and pop a few skulls. But my money's on the pigs not having anything to worry about, 'cause Texas is full of trash-talkin' BITCHEZZZ!

The police are unwitting participants in this experiment. Gathering data on intoxication is just the cover story. The real experiment is to see whether Texas is as tough as they talk, or if they're going to bitch out and take this shit. If the result is positive, somebody will roll up to the roadblock with an AR-15 and pop a few skulls. But my money's on the pigs not having anything to worry about, 'cause Texas is full of trash-talkin' BITCHEZZZ!

Your snarky hate-inciting comments aside.....

Local Fort Worth Police were involved, but they were off duty. I seriously doubt they were "unwitting". I would think that police departments have internal rules or state laws that have to be followed regarding notification to the department of off duty employment by officers.

These off duty cops might have flagrantly violated a state law by doing this, even while off duty. At the state level there is a state law that forbids involuntary traffic stops by police for the purposes of "checking everyone out as they go by" or for stuff like this "study". The usual legal reasons in Texas for traffic stops are still allowed.

According to tonight's TV news report, it seems like the Fort Worth City Council was not aware these cops were participating in this traffic stop. That "unawareness" is now getting those cops that worked the stop tossed into an investigation by the City Council. I hope that investigation does not get "disappeared"; I really hope something is done locally. I hope the local citizenry make an effort to pressure on the local TV stations to investigate this matter.

Did we make sure to get blood and saliva samples from the police officers and federal contractors as well?

I'd like to make sure that my samples aren't being mishandled due to drug- or alcohol-induced ineptitude.

I think this study was less to count the number of drunk drivers and more as a test to see how willing people are to give up their precious bodily fluids when demanded to do so by some random authority. Sort of checking to see if the frog has been boiled yet. Fortunately, it sounds as if some of those frogs were willing to still jump a little bit, as at least the named driver refused to everything but a breathalyzer.

There were no on-duty police officers involved...just off-duty officers and government contractors, illegally distrupting traffic, illegally collecting passive sensor data, even when consent was declined, and collecting a bunch of other information if you were willing to give it for free (the breathalyzer) or willing to be paid $10, $50, or $60, depending on how intrusive you let them get in exchange for money.

Everything about it was illegal; this was not a standard DUI checkpoint which contractors "embraced and extended", this was private citizens pulling over private citizens and collecting at least a minimum amount of data without consent.

This is a civil rights violation, and for each count where consent was not given after the fact, worth 20 years in a Federal prison.

Yeah, I know that this is what the first paragraph in the article says, but I have to wonder why KXAS even wrote that. The rest of the article specifically says the Fort Worth Police had no involvement - it was ran by the federal government, and they hired a few off-duty police officers - and that the Fort Worth Police was conducting an internal investigation about it.

This is again about the Federal Government overstepping their authority, and the federal government closing down a city road without consulting local law enforcement is horrible. The cities should really sue the federal government over this.

Moreso, Beach Street is an extreamely busy street, expecially now with all the construction in the area. The video says this is on the border of Fort Worth and Haltom City, and the video seems to confirm that area. This is a very busy area - I am usually over here a few times a month. The federal government closing off this area is inexcusable. I am sure that if someone had of called the FWPD about this when it was happening, the NHTSA contractors would have been arrested, and the off-duty officers placed on administrative leave - Fort Worth doesn't put up with that kind of crap.

It's a bit vague, but the contractors could just be there to do the actual sampling, and it's the police officer who forces them to submit. Probably better that way as I wouldn't trust cops to be phlebotomists (not because they're cops, but because even actual dedicated phlebotomists tend to miss veins too much IMO, and somebody who does it less often would probably be worse. I should know as I have to make frequent visits to get blood work.)

Also, and while I'm not trying to justify the situation at all (it actually stops being justified at a point long before the contractors are involved,) it's less wasteful if you contract somebody on a temporary basis rather than hire them full time for a project that you have no intention of running for a long time, only to wonder what the hell you're going to do with them when it's over and they're still getting paid with full time benefits.

Of course, if the government didn't make it so damn expensive to terminate employees that you no longer have a use for then it would be more attractive to actually hire people directly instead of so much contracting, even if it is only temporary. At least that way you could get benefits while working and/or don't have to work through a third party company who gets paid more for your work than you who are actually doing the labor.

No kidding. I read a study at least 5 years ago saying that you should not flick on veins to bring them to the surface when drawing blood. The pain response will constrict the veins. Instead, you should gently massage the area. To this day, I've always had my veins flicked at. Thankfully I have very large veins, but my wife isn't so lucky.

In Canada it is a Doctor or medical technician, who can refuse to draw blood if they don't feel like maybe being subpoenaed to court later and they have to take 2 samples so you can request one and get an independent test.

Sometimes. And yes they are taken by nursing staff and sent of to a lab for analysis. Basically if your booze bus looks like a minivan you're going to blow through the tube, and if you blow above 0.05 you have the option to accompany the police and accept the punishment, or the option to challenge the police and get taken back to the station for a blood test and then accept the punishment.

If your bus is the size of an interstate travel bus you can likely get the blood test on site. Either way it's a voluntary method of inconveniencing those who think they can game the system, or those who were silly enough to quickly down a shot and jump straight into the car.

Taking the option to go to the police station is often a good bet if you are near the limit. By the time they arrange to get you back there and do the test, especially on a busy Friday night, you might be under the limit again.

If you are sneaky you can even pretend to be more drunk than you are, so they don't prioritize your test on the assumption that you will still fail four hours later.

Driving when you're clearly drunk is always a bad idea. But someone who's right on the limit: only had a couple of beers, and one of them turned out to be a higher strength than they thought: he's a lot less of a danger than half the people on the road anyway. I agree that drink driving is senselessly taking lives of people who would still be alive is drunks were more responsible, but heavy-handed enforcement of arbitrary restrictions doesn't help anyone.

Sorry, but you are part of the problem. The fact that there is a legal amount you can drink and still drive is obscene. Passing the test is not the question. The question is whether you are a danger to others.

If you drink anything and get behind the wheel of a car before you are completely sober, you are endangering others. If you disagree, you are clearly ignorant of how alcohol affects judgement.

I was at a buddy's place a couple weeks ago... I had 4 beers while helping him work on his truck in the span of about 3.5 hours. In the past, I've calculated by my weight, that I can tolerate 1 can of beer per hour and still be fine so that has been my basic guideline. Anyway, I got about half a mile from his place and ran into what we call a "Checkstop" which is essentially a bunch of police cars and officers standing by visually profiling who to interview. I was asked whether i'd been drinking and how much and I answered honestly. I was asked to step out of the vehicle and to blow into a small handheld device. After a few false starts where I either blew too slowly or too quickly, or ran out of breath, I managed to blow a.025. Based on how I was feeling, I would probably have chosen not to drive if I'd had any more beer or less time... Based on my own gauge of drunkeness, I can conclude I've never driven anywhere near the lower limit (.05 here)... I realize everyone is not the same but I think you'd have to be a retard to feel you're ok to drive at.05 and.08 is right out.

Except that in the US, these rights are not granted by law, they exist regardless of it. The law is actually bared from violating them except in limited and specific ways. That is what is so important about a constitution and the need to change it rather than ignore it. It takes a lot more to change the constitution than it does to change a law.

Absolutely incorrect. Consider that in the United States, the Constitution is the only thing that grants the federal government any existence at all. Repeal the Constitution and legally speaking the federal government goes poof. Any attempt to enforce any federal 'law' after that is simple thuggary and the enforcer runs the risk of being shot as a criminal under state law.

In fact, that is a denial of the idea that any government exists by divine right. Since there is no divine right, it can only exist through consent of the governed as embodied by the Constitution.

The law of the jungle exists whether or not an invisible sky-man does. These so-called 'creator' granted rights are rights that every man is granted at birth by the rules of the jungle. We use the law of man to soften the edges of the law of the jungle so we can all live in peace.

The problem is when rights conflict. The classic example is that my right to swing my fist ends in the space you occupy. Another is my right of mobility vs your right to private property.In this case it seems to be the right not to be ran over by an impaired driver vs the right not to be unreasonably searched.While this case seems to go far over the line there is a line somewhere and balancing rights close to that line is hard.

Really. In my part of the world the government which went hardest for the free market and small government was New Zealand in the 80's. It was called Rogernomics, named after Reaganomics... except Roger Douglas actually did reduce the deficit unlike Reagan (by drastically cutting government services of course). How did it work out? Well, when the following administration continued largely the same policies under Ruth Richardson it was known as "Ruthenasia". Crime, poverty and unemployment kept increasing. My cousins and a significant portion of the population left the country. My country (Australia) tightened our mutually generous immigration arrangement with NZ to stem the tide.

A random warlord seizing power over a large city and her people, then marauding up and down, say, the West Coast, murdering at will, taking what women and rolls of toilet paper are left over from the pre-stupidpocalypse times would be better?

Can you explain how?

Because that's what you derpy anarchists are asking for. You either don't know the definition of the word, or you're mewling children without an ounce of sense or knowledge of human nature.

I realize the word Anarchy has, perhaps even more than Socialism or Communism, been succesfully divorced from its actual meaning, especially in far-right USA.

There are quite a few schools of thought within Anarchism other than the juvenile "watch it burn" style. Believing that there are better ways to run society than what we currently know as "the state" does not necessarily imply lawlessness and Mad Max dystopia. For one thing, most people I know who style themselves anarchists would prefer small, more or less self-sustaining communities and networks of lose association.

"Self-sustaining communities" is just another phrase for "isolated",...

Not at all. It means that you prefer to minimize external influences on essentials like food, water, energy, security. This has very little to do with being isolated (although you could probably find some communes which prefer isolation for its own merits). It's not about being cut off from everybody else, but about being independent. Not nearly the same thing.

... and isolated communities are almost never healthy, happy, places.

See above. But even if we assume that independent and isolated are the same thing, I would still argue that more or less isolated communities can in fact be healthy, happy, places.

And by "worked in Medieval times", you mean "worked for Kings, Queens, and other people of noble descent but not so much for the peasants." Anyone who thinks that the average person would be better if we went back to Medieval times doesn't understand history too well.

Not wanting to downplay such violent fringes at all, but this article [wikipedia.org] about those Black Banner cadres says

The typical age of the Chernoznamentsy was nineteen or twenty, and some of the most active adherents were as young as fifteen years old.

Which kind of reads like juvenile "watch it burn" adherents which I alluded to earlier.

I don't think we're actually in any significant disagreement here. I just regret the fact that the word "anarchy" has come to mean what you emphasize it now does, whereas the more mature aspects of the eponymous philosphy remain largely unknown.

People should read about Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, and so on -- they actually had some valuable things to say.

If the situation is ripe for anarchy then the people who want it for naive, but well-intended, reasons before hand aren't the people you should be worried about. Anarchy leaves a massive power vacuum which tends to be filled by the most dangerous and unscrupulous people.

Anarchy originally meant 'absence of a ruler' by definition it isn't anarchy if you are forced to accept someone as having control over you. What a lot of people want is very, very small and usually local governance and they think that means anarchy

While I agree with the point you are trying to convey, I think you chose a really bad way of driving (sorry about the pun) it home.

This is not a contract. This is the law. Violating it isn't a contract dispute. It is a criminal offense. There is not difference, as far as your consent goes, between driving without a license and driving under the influence.

You did not accept the rules when you got your license. The rules bind you whether you agree with them or not. Within the rules, you are free to choose not to get your license (and not drive), or to drive only when the law decides you are not prohibited from doing so.

Except that in the US there must be probable cause in order to detain people and search them. And absolutely yes! A breathalyzer, saliva (DNA) gathering, finger printing, paper checking, etc.. is all supposed to be illegal to gather without having probable cause. This is why "Stop and Frisk" was outlawed in New York (after way too long of it being done as the court case dragged on).

The citizens here need to file a suit here against the police involved, the contractors, and the US agencies involved. There have been a few suits against breathalyzers which have held them legal, but given by officers not "contractors".

Yea, that's why I referred to the summary and mentioned the coercion exception. From further reading it definitely comes under the coercion heading which is a violation of the basic right against unreasonable search.

The reason they pulled me over is because they "saw me swerving". I was doing nothing of the sort.

It's a trick. Some people may actually confirm that they were swerving (even though they weren't, and the cop knows it). This is where fun for the cops start, because a) the person just admitted not following the rules and b) maybe they did so because they have something to hide, so they're a good target for any search they can can be tricked into consenting to.

This is not a contract. This is the law. Violating it isn't a contract dispute. It is a criminal offense.

But presumably many/most of the people who were involuntarily detained and intrusively searched weren't committing a criminal offence, so what is the justification for the detention and search?

We shouldn't allow carte blanche intrusions into people's lives in exchange for just doing something that is a normal or even necessary part of those lives such as travelling from place to place or communicating with someone else. It's like saying we should condone arbitrary, abusive security theatre at an airport because terrrsm, and everyone "accepted" that they could be mistreated in those ways by buying a ticket so they have no grounds for complaint.

Here is a question... If you can't consent to sex while drunk, how can you consent to this research while drunk?

You consent to anything they want because

TASER!! TASER!! TASER!!

"~Officers, my Grandfather has a heart pacemaker!! Stop!!~"

Stop resisting!! Stop resisting!!

TASER!! TASER!! TASER!!

"~Officers, he's turning blue!! Stop!!~"

Stop turning blue!! Stop turning blue!!

TASER!! TASER!! TASER!!

Rinse & repeat until full and complete consent and compliance is achieved.

Sadly, these days with the way LE has increasingly been treating innocent people, it wouldn't surprise me in the least if something very similar has either already happened, or will be popping up in the news soon.

I know there are officers who many including themselves think of as "upstanding" and "heroic", and in many ways they are.

*However*, all of that good is rendered meaningless when these same officers say and do nothing when fellow officers abuse people and flaunt the law and civil rights.

What good is one officer going above & beyond to help get a young woman out of a dangerous/violent domestic situation, when a week later one of his/her fellow-officers puts her to work on the streets for one of "his" drug-dealing pimp "CI's", just to end up another dead junkie prostitute in some alley?

I'll start having more respect for LE when they stop the "blue wall of silence" BS and start cleaning out the bad/incompetent/criminal/bullying-thug officers instead of closing ranks.

"Honestly given the number of drunk idiots on the road, combined with the number of people who can't even drive properly when they are sober let alone inebriated (anyone who claims they aren't impaired at 0.08 is kidding themselves), I'm surprised people don't support this measure more."

And the worst part is, I always stay sober and drive, I've driven for years and never done anything wrong, but I will probably die in a head on collision with some drunk idiot who could not be avoided eh?

No, I get where you are coming from. There is something very basic in human consciousness that screams for a strong man to find the miscreants and spank them with inhuman(e) force. And this is the appeal of fascism...

But if you have any historical understanding you will know it does not, ultimately, work out as a good deal.

The cops had no probable cause for this so called "voluntary" pull over. Everyone driving was diverted and forced to pull in, and detained. According to TFA, if you bothered to read it, the driver discussing issues was harassed to the point of finally blowing in a breathalyser so that they could leave and return from work since it was during their lunch break that they were forced into a detainment area. For doing _NOTHING_!

Assuming you read TFA and understood that these people were not pulled over for doing anything wrong: By your broken logic, a cop should be able to jam a camera up your ass since you might be carrying illegal narcotics up there. Lets not forget you are consenting to the same treatment for your significant other.

If you didn't bother reading TFA and just assumed that these people were acting illegally and therefor pulled over you are just as broken in critical thinking. Congrats on being either the cooked frog or dangerously ignorant.

I honestly don't think there could ever be proper cause for that to begin with, since I believe the war on drugs is fundamentally wrong.

Yes — and of course, cops can create probable cause after the fact by "finding" drugs (or another material prohibited by possession laws) they've kept from a prior search and seizure to take down whomever. Great way to get more "collars;" divide up the drugs from one bust amongst as many "criminals" as they want or need. This is also one of the easiest ways for a non-cop to get rid of somebody for a while, since it requires no back-story or anything — the evidence and the "crime" are both the same physical item.

The only thing that I think needs a possession law — that is, the only thing that it is infeasible to simply make illegal to use — is a nuclear weapon. The rest are simply unjust, dangerously ripe for abuse, or both. Further, for many things that are illegal to have or own, no harm is done unless they're actually used in a specific manner, so those actions can simply be made illegal, and save a lot of harmless people a lot of grief; increase liberty; and lower enforcement and rehabilitation costs to the taxpayers.

"By your broken logic, a cop should be able to jam a camera up your ass since you might be carrying illegal narcotics up there."

Current cases studies on such:

"Last week, news wires, blogs and pundits lit up with the horrifying story of David Eckert, a New Mexico man who last January was subjected to a series of invasive and degrading drug search procedures after a traffic stop. The procedures, which included x-rays, digital anal penetration, enemas and a colonoscopy, were all performed without Eckert's consent..."

Yup I remember reading that and thinking at the time that any physicians involved should be disciplined by their medical college and have their license status re-examined, if not suspended. We doctors are not executioners for the state. Unless there is a valid medical reason to perform a medical procedure AND I have consent for said procedure, I cannot ethically perform said procedure. If the cops threaten to arrest me for "obstruction" or whatever, the correct answer for a physician is "then arrest me but I cannot do this". Police can never order physicians around and force them to use their art for non medical reasons. That's the main argument behind states not being able to get their hands on say, "lethal injection" drugs. The state is not licensed to practice medicine.

I don't think he is blowing this out of proportion. When the government violates people's rights, I see that as a very serious issue.

But first of all, it is in fact the job of the police to act on suspicion, and suspicion is a subjective term.

Then I wouldn't be surprised to find out that you're okay with the TSA, NSA, and a host of other nonsense.

As for the suspicion part - an amazingly high proportion of drivers, and perhaps professional drivers in particular, are found to drive under the influence of something

Even if true, that doesn't mean you can harass innocent people to see if they're innocent or not. I do not believe that is how any free country should operate. Do you have any sort of proof whatsoever that this specific individual is breaking the law? No? Then vanish, thug.

This is no different from stopping drivers to check their tyres or other things.

I do not believe that should happen either. Stop harassing people.

Blowing in a breathalyzer is not an unreasonably onerous task, so you might say refusing to do so does look a bit suspicious.

If you have nothing to hide, what do you have to fear? Just do what the thugs tell you; they're just harassing you to find out if you're innocent. Exactly what I'd expect from the land of the free and the home of the brave.

If a police officer feels you look or move in a way that arouse suspicion, then they have a valid reason - a duty, even - to look into it.

If a cop doesn't have a warrant or probable cause, they have a duty to leave me the alone. If they don't, I have a duty as a citizen to refuse their attempt and remind them about the Fourth Amendment. I have this duty because if I agreed to a search, then I further the normalization of pathetic submission, embolden the authorities, and increase for my fellow citizen the expectation that they, too, should needlessly submit to the whims of dangerous thugs.

I think that your idea that some people should be subject to increased harassment or interference by cops due to the way they "look or move" sounds pretty "suspicious" — that's the same way new people were divided up at Auschwitz.

Blowing in a breathalyzer is not an unreasonably onerous task [...]

I disagree. I want to be on my way without having to fool with a copper pushing an authoritarian agenda I disagree with. Getting a warrant or having probable cause to coerce me in the first place isn't onerous, and the burden belongs on the person accusing another of wrongdoing, not the innocent person minding his or her own business.

[S]o you might say refusing to do so does look a bit suspicious.

I'm sure I might not; I'd definitely say that someone yielding their precious civil rights to some dip-shit with a badge is a hell of a lot more suspicious than refusing a search when one has done nothing to deserve one.

Does Australia have something in it's constitution similar to the 4th amendment that the US has?

In other words, is it legal for a cop to pull you over "just to see if you might be committing a crime"? In the US, it is not, the cop has to have a probable cause to pull you over, or (in theory), anything the cop finds would not be allowed in court against you.

If so, then more power to you. It is illegal here, even if the cops try and do it anyway (which is just an abuse of power, but what are you going t

The whole concept of a driver's license was quite controversial when they began to be implemented. Many felt that it was intrinsically an infringement on citizen's rights. Many argued that the whole thing was just a scam to collect a little extra revenue (given that few states required any sort of test but did require a fee, the claim had merit).

One thing that is legally clear is that Constitutional rights are inalienable. That is, they cannot

In Australia it is called a 'Booze Bus'. They don't take blood, but they do the rest and it is 100% involuntary. They will block off freeways to test everyone and park cop cars in all the side streets.

Personally I am mostly OK with this. The next morning when you see the huge line of cars left behind because the drivers were drunk justifies it to me.

The reduced number of deaths from Drink Drivers are the price we pay for this in Australia.

I've driven in the US and the standard of driving is absolutely shocking. Even ignoring the speeding (yes, everyone speeds over there) there is little to no lane discipline (keeping to the outside lane, people cant stay in their lane), I saw about 3 people indicate during my entire time, people will cut you off with little or no warning, people also slow down and stop with no warning (and I'm not talking about a gr

We're not even considering the terrible road designs like all way stops. Yep, all roads have a stop sign. In theory you give way to your right, in reality it's whoever has the balls to go first

I've been to South Africa a few times, they have 4-way stop signs too. The way it works there is when you get to the line, everyone who is already stopped on the other entries goes before you, then you go. All-in-all it works quite well. In fact, when they have one of their frequent power outages and the traffic lights go out, the drivers just treat the intersection as a 4-way stop and get on with it.

I've driven in the US and the standard of driving is absolutely shocking. Even ignoring the speeding (yes, everyone speeds over there) there is little to no lane discipline (keeping to the outside lane, people cant stay in their lane), I saw about 3 people indicate during my entire time, people will cut you off with little or no warning, people also slow down and stop with no warning (and I'm not talking about a gradual stop, they slam on the brakes), people push in, block intersections and completely disregard the lights (yellow means gun it, red means gun it more as you've missed the yellow). These are common things, not the odd occurrence like here in Oz.

Hey, Welcome to Boston!

Seriously, though, you speak as if driving in the US is a monolithic thing; it's not. When I lived in Boston, the motto was 'Don't use your turn signals, you'll be giving away your strategy'. Manhattan was even worse, since rather than dangerous, psychotic rules, there appeared to be no rules at all. On the other hand, in other places I've been (rural virginia, Utah, a couple of other places), drivers have been polite and safe. When I visited Australia, I was surprised at how the country felt the same culturally as I visited different places (Sydney, Darwin, Alice Springs, Cairns, Port Douglas) though the geography changed. In the US, people seem quite different in the different areas.

In Australia it is called a 'Booze Bus'. They don't take blood, but they do the rest and it is 100% involuntary. They will block off freeways to test everyone and park cop cars in all the side streets.

Personally I am mostly OK with this. The next morning when you see the huge line of cars left behind because the drivers were drunk justifies it to me.

They have absolutely zero probable cause or reason to stop random people just to see if they're innocent. Harassing people to check their innocence is a terrifying concept, and not something I'd expect from what a country that's supposed to be the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Since when has driving drunk been an inalienable right?

What a straw man. If they had evidence that each individual they stopped had been driving under the influence, then you'd have a point. Unfortunately for you, they're stopping people randomly, thereby harassing them and violating their rights.

If you are using a public road then you are using someone elses property. It is completely within the rights of a government to bind usage of their roads to certain conditions.

I do not believe it is completely within the rights of a government to bind usage of roads to certain conditions, or usage of any public place to certain conditions. In fact, the government has privileges, not rights. It's a public place for a reason! It is public.

This is not something I believe happens in any free country.

If you don't like it don't use public roads, simple. By using them you implicitly agree.

That is absurd. Just like I don't agree to be molested by the TSA when I go into an airport, or I don't agree to give up all my rights when I go into public places in general, I do not agree, implicitly or otherwise, to have government thugs randomly harass me just because I want to drive on a public road! What part of this do you bootlickers not understand?

This is the logic of tyrants.

and most of the European countries are more free than the US these days.

Certainly not in that regard! And since when do you care about freedom? From my perspective, you've made it clear that you don't. For some reason, you're going to great lengths to justify this violation of freedom, and I have no idea why some people find the government's boots to be so tasty.

If the government exercises its right to (even randomly) check if people follow the rules on its own property it's not harassment.

It has no such right, or even privilege. We have something called the fourth amendment in the US, and no, they can't randomly decide it doesn't apply just because you're on a public road.

To emphasize this point further than cheekyjohnson's excellent reply, governments do not have rights in the US. Citizens have rights. It is painfully clear in the US Constitution that rights are intended only as a partial enumeration of restrictions and constraints on government activity against various categories of people, individually or in groups (particularly, "the people", "citizens", and "voters").

The only distinction I would make is that governments in the US have "powers" not "privileges". That's the usual term in the Constitution for the stuff they are allowed and mandated to do. In practice, I believe attempts to take away such things have often been found unconstitutional. For example, the US Congress occasionally delegates too much power to the executive branch via legislation and the US Supreme Court has found those to occasionally be unconstitutional.

There is only one place in the US Constitution where a government body is alleged to have rights. The Twelfth Amendment alleges that the US House of Representatives has the possibility of a "right of choice" in selected an elected president (basically after the usual electoral methods fail, and the House gets their chance at picking a US president). This terminology is echoed again in the Twentieth Amendment which modifies the same part of law (and hence, has to use the same terminology as the Twelfth Amendment).

I think that single instance can be explained as someone screwing up the language of the former amendment when they wrote it.

Bottom line is you don't know what you're talking about when you speak of "rights" of a US-based government.

"I do hope you get taken out by a drunk, drugged unlicensed driver whilst avoiding one of these."

I hope he runs over you first. Your belief in regard to what constitutes "freedom" is a hell of a lot more dangerous than some drunk driver.

--
"That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved." -- Benjamin Franklin, letter to Benjamin Vaughan, March 14, 1785.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) 32,885 people died in traffic crashes in 2010 in the United States (latest figures available), including an estimated 10,228 people who died in drunk driving crashes, accounting for 31% of all traffic deaths that year. (http://www.centurycouncil.org/drunk-driving/drunk-driving-fatalities-national-statistics).

Depending on whose statistics you use, the number of innocent people maimed or otherwise permanently disabled by drunk drivers may exceed 100,000 victims per year.

Taking blood is ridiculous, But breathalyzers save lives. That many of the 10,000 people who die in drunk driving crashes are innocent people who are driving other cars, or are pedestrians, or are passengers, warrants road blocks and breathalyzers, especially on weekend evenings.

Yes, there should be a "red line" defining "reasonable" limits on police searches. But in America, the cost in deaths, pain, and suffering mean that to reduce the odds of some moron injuring me or my loved ones, I'll give up a reasonable degree of freedom and support politicians who promote breathalyzer roadblocks.

Anyone with half a brain does not use the word "cuz" (which is short for cousin in Australia and New Zealand and is typically used by junkies or people with as much intellegence as a junkie).

In these parts cuz is shorthand for because. After misspelling "intelligence", "don't" and s/drink/drunk/ you will forgive me for ignoring the ad hominem garbage.

You have a choice, you can simply not drive. No driving, no random breath tests.

I live in a State with a constitution protecting the rights of people to be left alone and not arbitrarily searched without cause.

Remember that driving is not an inalienable right, its a privileged and a privileged that drink drivers abuse

How does having a drivers license effect your constitutional right to not be searched without cause? For what legal reason does it even matter? Being on foot while drunk is also a crime why is a vehicle necessary to justify search without cause?

a privileged that drink drivers abuse

..hiccup...

Seeing as you're a fan of hyperbole, seeing as you're using ridiculous analogies against this, you are as culpable in road deaths as the drink drivers themselves (this is sarcasm to demonstrate the ridiculousness of the OP's analogy, for those who cant tell).

The only justification you had made for your position was it gets results. There is a falsifiability problem inherent in only asserting ends justify means. My analogy was only intended as a device to illuminate this problem so that it can be avoided in the future. Any statement which cannot be falsified contains no useful information.

Shooting cops tends to be...unproductive in the medium term. Their initial performance is likely to be underwhelming; but after that, you'll be lucky if they just empty a dozen magazines into your corpse, since that will at least keep you out of SuperMax Forever Fun Time.

The response will be rather reminiscent of MiB, when "Edgar" gave the alien "Bug", in the fresh impact crater on his farm, a similar response when told to drop his weapon.

"Your proposal is acceptable."

LE officers these days no longer accept nearly as much personal risk to avoid injuring/killing subjects. The amount of time, risk, and effort to try and defuse & deescalate situations before tasers and/or firearms are used against subjects has dramatically fallen over the last 25-35 years.

This is largely due to extreme militarization coupled with the "officer safety first" and "*I'm* going home tonight!" mentality culture and training. Also, it seems like the psych-screening and attitude/demeanor suitability culling processes have suffered greatly, judging by the tsunami of YT videos available recording a huge and ever-growing number of over-the-top LE behaviors and actions.

Besides, as long as they don't kill you, you can hurt them much worse and for far longer with paper than with bullets, as long as the court system and rule of law means anything at all. I'll leave that for you to judge.

Check out what DHS will do to one of their own who tries to do their duty. They used a freaking Blackhawk and a military style 27-man SRT to raid her and her husband's house. The 24-year-old neighbor who video-recorded the raid and Blackhawk was found dead in his house of unknown causes. If they'll do that to one of their own, what are they willing to do to you or I if we should happen to attract their anger over something we said, or something we have no clue would have any connection to anything government or cause any kind of reaction by anyone at all?